This Week's Cul de Sacs, April 30 to May 6, 2012

Here are the roughs I sent to Stacy Curtis for this week of strips. Besides inking Cul de Sac, Stacy's got a full plate of children's book work, some of which involves traveling for school visits. This means he has to do the inking in a hotel room, not the most ideal situation for us sensitive art types whose psyches demand a familiar work environment to maintain creative flow.

So I thought a repeating Petey might make things easier all around. And as Petey tends to freeze up under mild duress all it needed was a stinkbug to provide just that.

 

Having decided on repeating Peteys-

 

it was an easy jump to overdoing it-

 

and piling the Peteys on.

 

If one flustered Petey is funny then an infinite number of them'd be a riot-

I hope. These are representative of the batch of roughs I foist on Stacy every week. Note how they get gradually sloppier as I lose track of the progress of the meager story arc. In fact I had no idea how to end it, so I told Stacy I would do the climactic Saturday strip, which features enough second panel exposition by Alice to frighten off anyone who dislikes text-heavy balloons.

So it all worked out well enough.

I did the Sunday about a month ago. It's photoshopped out of a dozen bits and pieces but, ssshh, don't tell anybody. Alice and Dill have had several Drawing Fights; victory has been disputed in all of them.

It's National Cartoonists Day Again Again, Again

You may be wondering, "How can I best celebrate this festive day?" You might consider:

• Finding a cartoonist near you and mowing his (or her) lawn, at least the front lawn (especially the hard part with the hill).
•  While you're at it trim his shrubs, so the mailman can find his front door again.
• I'll bet he needs a haircut pretty bad.
• Does his house need vacuuming? Well, what are you waiting for?
• Who left all these dishes in the sink?
• The cats; somebody feed the cats.
• Are you handy with a pen? Ink some cartoons for him!
• You could take him to lunch at the Mexican place down the street, where they're having some no doubt cartoonist-related celebration.
• For God's sake laugh at his cartoons. If they appear in a newspaper, buy extra copies (or multiple subscriptions, even) and laugh at them too.
• Is he not posting anything new on his stupid blog and it's driving you crazy? You should send him a cheerful card stuffed with cash to inspire him.

Note: if the cartoonist near you is a lady, please substitute "her" for "his". The original of the cartoon reproduced above is in the collection of the fabulous Mr. Jef Mallett, so this is a scan of the Almanac book page. And it's the same one I ran last year, and the year before, if it looks familiar.

More Restaurant Closings

This might be the first one I did, c.1999.

Restaurant Closings

Like many newspapers, the Washington Post runs a column listing various health code violations for the week. Each entry describes the circumstances leading to a closure of a food establishment by the investigating health department. Here's a sample of a recent column:

Hollywood Bistro
1800 G St. NW
Closed Friday for operating without a certified food manager.
Lucky Corner Market
5433 Georgia Ave. NW
Closed April 19 for operating without a license, gross unsanitary conditions and operating without a certified food manager. Reopened April 23.
Mid-City Deli
1418 14th St. NW
Closed Friday for failure to minimize vermin, circumstances that might endanger public health and improper food holding temperatures.

It's buried in the Local Living type section along with another column equally enjoyable, the Animal Watch, listing those run ins with animals, wild and domesticated, that've required the intervention of a vested authority. (Its probably-untoppable apex was reached years ago with a report about a squirrel found racing around inside a single-family residence. Two policemen showed up after the homeowner called 911 and quickly isolated the rodent in the living room curtains, but the squirrel broke free and dove into a grand piano. One officer, thinking quickly, played a few bars of something by Toad the Wet Sprocket and the squirrel shot out of the piano and disappeared out the front door.)

These columns appeal to me for all kinds of reasons: the poker faced style, the easily graspable nature of the incidents and, in the case of the health code violations, the fact that restaurants are  fun to draw. When I was doing the Poor Almanac (1997-2009) and was looking for an idea (always) I could usually scare up enough jokes to fill out the cartoon without the desperation being too apparent. Because restaurants are not only fun to draw; they're inherently funny.

Here's one of only 4 or 5 in color, from c. 2000. Lugubrio's is based on a place near Dupont Circle where the lights were so low the waiters were disembodied voices and you ate by feel, often off another's plate.

Note the local cuisine reference, another sore point in DC as it has so few recognizable traits to call its own.

Today's Cul de Sac in Rough Form, April 30 2012

A word of warning: Petey doesn't move a muscle all week. I find it makes things easier to draw if they're static and repetitive (and I hope Stacy agrees). I'm telling you this up front in case you're hoping for big action sequences or derring-do so you're not disappointed.

Today's Cul de Sac, April 29 2012

Alice communes with Nature, in condensed, easily accessible form. Every kid needs a shrub to hide in. I've had several and I was intimately familiar with every inch of dirt it covered (though not familiar enough that I avoided sitting on a slug during a night game of hide and seek).

Here's Alice's first venture into Nature. As always, I thought today's would be easy to draw, but no. Scribbly masses of leaves keep not looking like leaves but only like scribbles unless I fuss with them, and then they look too fussy.

Today's Cul de Sac in Rough Form, April 28 2012

This is the rough of today's strip I sent to Stacy Curtis for inking. I draw the roughs on Canson Marker Layout, a semi-translucent paper, using various sizes of Micron pens. Then I email it to Stacy, who prints it out to his preferred size and slaps it on a lightbox, then inks it on bristol with one of his grungiest, unwashed and most-favorite pens while I take a nap. I did a little photoshop fussing around with the middle panel. It originally had hundreds of tiny zombie toads, and I realized it's an unnecessary cruelty to inflict crowds on my inker, so I simplified it. Some.

And that's how a comic strip collaboration is run these days.

Ernesto

This is a clip job of previous posts and is meant to shed some light on a character who is a little hard to explain.

Below is the first appearance of Ernesto Lacuna, in the Post Magazine. I brought the stranger-than-Petey little boy back a few times, and I gave him the strange attribute that Petey thinks he may be imaginary. His name is a reference to Lacuna, a gap or missing section in a manuscript, text or piece of music, and an obscure musical pun on the name of Cuban composer Ernesto Lacuona (boy, this gets a laff every time, but you'll recognize this). You'll notice he plays the oboe and Petey's got a trombone; this was later reversed. Please excuse the awkward formatting.

Ernesto is one of my favorite characters to write for. He's something of a Bond villain in embryo, as is evident from his remark below about the extinct volcano, and he's enigmatic enough that I can write dialog that doesn't always make sense as long as it's vaguely threatening.

But Ernesto's also unimpressive enough that he's hard to take seriously. He's based on several kids I knew who wanted to grow up in a hurry under the mistaken impression that adults have all the power. Ernesto belongs to a group called Future Adults of America whose purpose is to gradually take over the world so that they'll be running it by the time they're in their forties, and he keeps trying to get Petey to attend FAA meetings. Which, from Ernesto's description, is mostly an excuse to issue position papers and to eat doughnuts. Disliking organized activities and food with holes in it, Petey has declined so far. Maybe he should go sometime, as it'd be fun to draw. This is the kind of idea I love, as I can revisit it, explore it further and get a lot out of it. And nothing's better than that when you're dealing with a daily strip.

During the Summer months, Ernesto barricades himself in a carrel fort in a remote corner of the library. This Sunday strip above is the remnant of a string of dailies featuring one of Ernesto's periodic decline-and-falls. This time he was caught by the Future Adults of America appropriating a box of doughnuts meant for fund-raising and subsequently kicked out. I think he started a competing group but I forget what it was called.

Ernesto's actuality is best left unexamined, I think.

Maybe he's a wormholian who can slide between realities (I knew kids like this).

Or maybe he's a projection of the zeitgeist. Whatever, he's good for laffs when used sparingly. Some readers find him annoying, though he was a favorite of one of my best editors. Below is my favorite Ernesto appearance (available in the first CdS book or in the Golden Treasury).

Cul de Sac Yesterday and Today, April 21& 22 2012

So I inked these two strips all by myself, which is kind of novel these days.

Either he's gotten a new haircut or I've forgotten how Andre Chang's head is shaped. He's been gradually increasing in size since he was first sighted in the strip 20 months or so ago. Someone told me he's really one of Sendak's Wild Things and there's no stopping him from getting larger and hairier, but that's life.

From August, 2010,when Alice first met Andre. Below, another Dill's Dream Sunday, meaning another excuse to draw something I wouldn't otherwise draw.

Poor Almanac That's Slightly On Topic

As long as we're talking about art auctions, here's an Almanac from 2006, when perfume magnate Ronald Lauder paid about $135 million for a painting by Gustav Klimt. Entitled "Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer Wearing the Wallpaper", it was described by Lauder as "our Mona Lisa". Some thought it was maybe not the best buy for $135 million (even though it's got bits of real gold in it).

Anyway, I did this list of mnemonic devices to help others from making the same mistake. These are not to be used by those bidding in tee Team Cul de Sac auction, of course.

Auction Preview

Take a look at this line up! Wouldn't any of them look nice over your sofa or fireplace?

Boing Boing

A few weeks ago I talked to Glenn Fleishman, the well-respected writer on technology who's also been a sound-board operator, typesetter, graphic designer, curriculum developer, course manager, catalog manager, programmer, editor, conference planner, speaker, book-information expert, columnist, reporter and radio guest.

I don't know anything about any of that stuff, so we talked about cartoons, another of Glenn's passions as anyone who follows his lively Twitter feed knows. The wonderful site Boing Boing, home of Tom the Dancing Bug, posted the results of our chat here.

The Auction

Here, for the first time anywhere (unless Chris sparks has beaten me to it), is the official ad that Heritage Auctions has put together for the Team Cul de Sac auction.

Now Go Listen to Stacy Curtis

Now that you've committed Chris Sparks' interview to memory you need to do the same with Tom Racine's interview with Stacy Curtis. Stacy spills the beans on his early, violent career as an editorial cartoonist, describes our Clouseau-and-Cato-like working relationship and explains his Banjo Pig Awareness program.

An Easter Tradition

It's kind of an Easter tradition around here to post this old Almanac cartoon, Okay, posting old cartoons is more like a daily tradition around here. Whatever it takes to keep this blog on its legs, short of uploading photos of our cats doing funny things.

Go Listen to Chris Sparks

Tall Tale Radio's Tom Racine, who's got a Golden Voice and knows how to use it, talks to Chris Sparks  about comics, comic book shops, Sergio Aragones, Team Cul de Sac, how he wasn't drunk the first time met him and more!

Episode 140 – Chris Sparks
by Tom Racine on March 25, 2012
http://www.talltaleradio.com/episode-140-chris-sparks/

Cul de Sac for March 26, 2012

Starting tomorrow, March 26th, I'll be producing Cul de Sac with the assistance of Stacy Curtis. Stacy's a cartoonist, illustrator and printmaker who draws editorial cartoons, comics and illustrations and is now doing mostly children's books (I find children's book illustrators to be uniquely trustworthy). He'll be doing the inking, mostly on the daily Cul de Sacs. He also promises to go out for doughnuts and coffee, a nice gesture but somewhat useless as he lives 700 miles away.

Except for freelancing illustration, which is by its nature collaborative, I've never worked with anyone before. Some types of comics are built for this kind of piece-work, notably comic books, which distribute the work among divers hands much the way a medieval studio would. But a comic strip, being small and intensely imagined, usually has just one name on it, usually the guy who started it (though often anonymous craftsmen are involved in writing, drawing, lettering,  etc. - ssshh! you didn't hear it from me).

I'll continue to write Cul de Sac and draw roughs for Stacy to try to decipher and I'll do as much of the final inking as I can. Of the weeks of strips we've produced so far I've inked only the Sundays, though that may vary from week to week. 

This change isn't made lightly; I'm as obsessive and grabby and unwilling to share as some four-year-olds I could name. But after some months of missed deadlines and last-minute repeats I'm willing to bend a little. My thanks to the folks at Universal for being sensitive and helpful, especially John Glynn, one of the most helpful and sensitive former Chicago cops I've worked with; Shena Wolf, a more appreciative and unflappable editor than I deserve; and Lee Salem, the most supportive man in the business.

And thanks, Stacy. So far so good, huh?

Back to Work, You!

So I'm back to work in the funny pages on Monday, with a few changes.

Spring! or, I've been neglecting my lazy reposting

Reposted for like the umpty-umpth time, plus one.

This Week's Cul de Sacs

This week's strips will likely debut on the New York Times Children's Picture Book Bestseller List, because pretty much everything Mo Willems does makes it on the list. Because Mo Willems is just that good. And he's done pretty much everything.

Unfortunately, my daughters, being born too soon and consequently being too old, missed out on Mo's menagerie; the Pigeon, Elephant and Piggie, Leonardo the Terrible Monster, Naked Mole Rat and my favorite, Knuffle Bunny and Trixie. Which means I never got a chance to read Mo's oeuvre aloud to a sleepy child.

But I did get a chance to have a Gookie-off with Mo, which is the next best thing-

 

But wait, there's more! This week's Cul de Sacs wouldn't show up in reproduction, would be but pale shadows, without the sensitive inking that cartoonist and illustrator Stacy Curtis provided. If you need a dab hand with pen and ink, Stacy is the man to call. And if you call him, you'll soon find yourself drawing a Banjo Pig.

 

I'd better get mine drawn if Ii know what's good for me.

In Case You Missed It

There's a good interview with Ruben Bolling by Tom Spurgeon over at The Comics Reporter. Which you should be reading every day, you know.

The Complete St. Patrick's Day Poor Almanacs

Collected here for the first time. Enjoy it while you can. On Sunday they're going back in the vault.

The latest Alice

Here's a preview of the first strip I've inked since circa 19-aught-12. It's a Sunday page and it took me 14 hours of concentrated effort just to do the head. Note the generous slathering of white-out to disguise the places where things went south (this was supposed to be Petey, I don't want to talk about it).

This Week's Cul de Sacs

At the drawing board this week is Mr. Lincoln Peirce, who knows how to do a kid strip better than anybody, seeing as how he's been drawing Big Nate since 1991. The best comic strips are those that appear to happen spontaneously; the person whose name appears as its author just follows the characters around and transcribes events as incisively as possible. That's what Big Nate is and that's what Lincoln does, only of course he doesn't. He has to invent everything, all of Nate's manias and frustrations, and he makes it look large as life and twice as natural.

And he's doing it in Cul de Sac this week and doing a masterful job. Which is great, if you're a reader. But it sure raises the bar for those of us who have to sit at the drawing board in the near future.

I'm particularly fond of this strip. I liked the flying monkeys, the witch scared me silly.

The Scottish Play for Fifth Graders

There's not much going on here right now. You should go read my wife's blog on teaching Shakespeare to fifth graders the fun way - with sword fights, murders and Haka dances! Kids today have all the fun.

A Visit to the Library

I scanned these so I might as well post them.

This Week's Cul de Sacs

Is this great or what? I should've taken time off from the strip years ago! Because look who stepped up to pinch hit this week - one of my cartoon heroes, the polymathical comics virtuoso, Ruben Bolling!

I first saw Ruben's work in the late 90s when the Washington Post Weekend section started running his weekly strip, Tom the Dancing Bug. And I didn't get it at all. The first strip the Post ran baffled me (I don't remember what it was). But the second strip to run knocked me over and made me laugh out loud, something cartoons rarely do (I don't remember what it was either).  Tom the DB always seemed out of place in the Weekend section, a refugee from the alternative papers on the last page of the Post's goings-on-about-town section; its natural habitat would be in the DC City Paper between Shawn Belschwender and Lynda Barry. And not just for its wide-open format, but for its incredibly sharp sense of satire and parody. Tom the DB covers politics, economics, religion, sex, the law, pop culture, etc, etc, with devastating logic and, that rare thing, a truly funny sense of humor.

It's obvious to anyone looking at Ruben's work will notice right away that he's got a fondness for comics of almost any genre. From superhero to talking animal, he can parody them all, but none so well as the newspaper comic strip. So when he agreed to steer Cul de Sac for a week I worried: would Dinkle the Unlovable Loser show up and steal Dill's kidneys? But my fears are probably unfounded. Ruben can write for characters with irony and affection (go see his strips dealing with hapless, clueless middle-schooler Louis Maltby). I think Cul de Sac's in safe hands. And that Dill's-kidneys gag would work great as a Sunday page with Dill's brothers doing the stealing.

Here's one of Ruben's greatest hits from a few years ago, ironically not drawn by him-